Seeking the Sacred

By Paul Dunion / December 19, 2018

An ancient definition of the word sacred is “confirming what truly matters”.  Obviously, it’s always a good time to confirm what truly matters.  However, the Winter Solstice ushering in diminished light, Christmas, Hanukkah and an end of the year review may be a fitting time to confirm what truly matters.  I recommend suspending some probing…

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Returning to the Light

By Paul Dunion / December 9, 2018

Once darkness descends, it can be very difficult to return to the light. Darkness comes when you feel forgotten by those you deeply hoped would remember you.  Darkness comes when loss arrives seemingly indifferent about the removal of your health or a loved one succumbing to illness or injury. Darkness comes when a cherished belief…

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Radical Parenting

By Paul Dunion / November 30, 2018

Radical Parenting There is a strong distinction between effective parenting and radical parenting. We can think about effective parenting including: providing safety and continuity to a child’s life, offering encouragement, acknowledgement of a child’s emotional experience, holding authority with clear boundaries that are neither abusive nor reflecting abdication, supplying logical consequences for unacceptable behavior, addressing…

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A Blessing for Healing

By Paul Dunion / November 18, 2018

May your healing stories grow, with clarity about the wounding, embellished by depictions of boldness, grace, resolve and forgiveness.  Let these narratives find some small place where the voices of the demons haunting your soul continue to soften. When the journey invites you to turn against yourself, remember those who came before you, your ancestors,…

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A Blessing for Shyness

By Paul Dunion / November 14, 2018

Shyness has been greatly misunderstood with insinuations of a missing courage and a loss of spirit.  I have always found shyness to be trustworthy, lacking in pretense, with no striving to impress. However, the trustworthiness of shyness far exceeds what it doesn’t do. I’m thankful to say that after years of turning away and toward…

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BOUNDARIES AND THE HEALING OF DEVELOPMENTAL TRAUMA

By Paul Dunion / November 8, 2018

  Trauma can be defined as an unregulated nervous system due to the violation of a physical, sexual or emotional boundary. An unregulated nervous system tends to constrict thinking, feeling and acting. Developmental trauma is the result of repeated violations throughout childhood. It leaves violated individuals confused about how to support their own safety. These…

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The Heart’s Fool

By Paul Dunion / October 29, 2018

It was inevitable, right from the beginning.  My original home, tucked away, gently resting in the cavern of my mother’s belly, with her waters protecting me from harm.  And then the push, a push I will experience throughout my life in so many different ways.  Urging me forward toward an unwelcome separation and a broken…

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Being Present

By Paul Dunion / January 31, 2018

We have been strongly encouraged by spiritual visionaries and social scientists to focus our attention on the here-and-now. Similar to most ancient definitions, the word present is treated mostly as a verb denoting action, and not a noun. An old definition of the word present is “being at hand, not absent”. We can translate “being…

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A Crisis of Morality

By Paul Dunion / December 19, 2017

There is a crisis of morality that deserves to be identified and understood.  Such a crisis can be described as confusion regarding what will sustain our hearts, our minds and our bodies.  We simply elected a leader who behaviorally yelled, “I’m going to take the swamp you created, strip it of its sophistication and subtlety,…

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Beyond Abusive Compensations of Power, Addressing Sexual Harrassment

By Paul Dunion / December 19, 2017

I am encouraged by Stephen Marche’s New York Times article, “The Unexamined Brutality of the Male Libido”.  Mr. Marche appropriately invites men to take their masculinity seriously: “… let’s start with a basic understanding that masculinity is a subject worth thinking about”. It is an extremely worthwhile summons that has been duly ignored since Herb…

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